1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a schema mapping specification framework, and more particularly to a schema mapping specification framework for representing mappings between heterogeneous schema models.
2. Related Art
Each conventional software tool for mapping a source schema A to a target schema B utilizes its own model and language to express a high-level description of how A is to map to B, its own model to capture the semantic meaning of that high-level description, and its own architecture to interpret that model to generate executable code. These characteristics of known mapping tools lead to the following deficiencies and limitations. First, there is a significant duplication of effort with regard to development and maintenance of multiple mapping tools. Each mapping tool requires its own development team to build, develop and maintain the tool. Second, there is an inconsistent look and feel and behavior across a product family. Customers who purchase multiple products from an enterprise must become conversant with each of the mapping tools, and learn the differences and similarities between them. Finally, there is a lack of tool interoperability. A mapping produced by one tool cannot be consumed by another tool, and vice versa. Thus, there exists a need in the art to overcome the deficiencies and limitations described above.